It is becoming more and more difficult to rank and get organic traffic from Google unless you are a big business with a considerable marketing and SEO budget. But there’s one place where you can still rank and get traffic and leads from, and that is the local search landscape.
Lead generation includes the strategies of getting the attention of a person, converting them into prospects, and ultimately a customer. Since you operate locally, you need to attract the locals.
Here is how you can generate more local leads online:
Focus on Local SEO
Local Search Engine Optimization (SEO) can be instrumental in bringing you new leads. For a local business, the SEO strategies should focus on the local audience. If you have a business in Pittsburgh, a user, although interested in your product, but residing in North Dakota may not be of any use to you.
That is why you need to pinpoint the target audience for your SEO strategies. Ranking well locally on the search engines can help a lot with local lead generation. In the case of local search, the search engines churn out sites with local content, links, and social media profiles to provide relevant results.
Spend on local Ads through Facebook and Adwords
Facebook has become quite pervasive and holds exceptional targeting capacity. It is the best option for local businesses to find their potential customers. For instance, you have opened a flower business in Seattle. Valentine’s Day is approaching and you need to spread the word.
Facebook is a great way to attract new customers. It will help you reach out to people in a relationship within your area. All you have to do is write a simple, unique caption for the ad. To generate leads through Facebook, give the ad with the ‘Conversion’ option. Target every visitor of your page/website who has given contact info on the form.
You can also consider turning lead generation through ads into a business. That is called lead flipping and there’s a course that teaches you exactly how to do that. Read my review of Modern Millionaires here.
Optimize Your Website
Optimize your website for mobile and UX users. With a rigorous SEO strategy, user experience also matters for lead generation. Around 83 percent of internet users are on mobile, so it is crucial to ensure a better user experience for them.
Moreover, 63 percent of people use mobile devices to search local enterprises. 73 percent of the mobile searches become purchases while only 50 percent of the desktop searches are conversions. So, your website for mobile devices should be user-friendly.
If that is not enough to convince you, you should know that Google is penalizing sites that lack an optimized mobile design. Your website design is the major way you can leave a good first impression on a visitor.
Work on Local SEM
Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is an advertising strategy that makes a business’s services visible in the search engine results. It enables your business to be included in the search results when a user types a term relevant to your business.
You can also leverage this strategy to generate leads. These are targeted search engine ads and attract already engaged users. Make sure your ad placement ranks well for the local search commands and keywords. That way, you can generate unique local leads.
Optimize Your Social Media Presence
Social media can be one of the most lucrative marketing mediums of the present age. Even if you are not running ads, just sharing the relevant and engaging content can promote your business. Only last year, around one billion new social media accounts entered the arena. That means you can easily reach out to your potential customers and connect with them on a personal level.
Optimize your social presence, as these platforms own the raw power of lead generation. Even if your business has social media accounts, you might not be using the right strategy to garner local leads. Focus on content and frequency and rest will get in place automatically.
Create Content Relevant to Locals
The internet is reeling with generic, broad content. For instance, in the marketing niche, there are thousands of articles on digital marketing, social media marketing, and so on. However, the content on location-specific subjects is scarce.
So, generate quality content that is engaging as well as relevant to your local audience. Make sure that the content is unique, as rephrasing the existing content would not get you anywhere.
